Good news! Last week over 100 nations formally agreed in Dublin to ban the use of cluster bombs. However some countries declined to participate in the ban, including the United States! Yup the USA finds air-dropped or ground-launched munitions that eject a number of smaller submunitions (a cluster of bomblets) totally cool. (Don’t be fooled, although the word bomblet is adorable these nasty killers which release many small unexploded bomblets over a wide area can remain dangerous for many months or years. Cluster munitions can cause fatal or serious injury to local populations long after the end of the conflict.)

Most NATO countries have backed the pact. Opponents say the bombs cause indiscriminate injury,

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Nicole Richie and husband Joel Madden made this video supporting the UNICEF campaign to raise funds for 8 million children affected by the Myanmar cyclone.

by getting involved at http://www.unicef.org.

Related links:

Cyclone in Myanmar: Top Ten Ways To Help

UNICEF

NY Times: Myanmar Articles

The WB will return as an online video Web site, featuring short original series with classic shows. The WB first launched in 1995 and then closed in 2006. 

TheWB.com, and a complementary site for children called KidsWB.com, are part of a digital destination strategy by Warner Brothers, a subsidiary of Time Warner, to tailor Web sites to specific audiences.

In trying to compete for consumers’ time, Warner and other media companies have sought new outlets for content, sometimes bypassing the traditional network structure and creating broadband Internet channels. [NY Times]

This isn’t the WB’s first online venture, they also created the site MomLogic, a site for mothers, in 2007. MomLogic is a community where Moms from all walks of life and in all stages of motherhood come together.  If you’re a mom that wants a safe place to get information and share your own experiences and join the community at momlogic.com.

Ascending environmental awareness is inspiring a new wave of green technology, with some of the newer incarnations being portable music and video players. What’s so special about these portable players? They’re totally self-powered and completely off the grid - no batteries or cords needed.

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Okay, if you’re going to write a book and it’s going to a made up story, oh why sell it as non-fiction?

Margaret Seltzer author the memoir, Love and Consequences about growing up as a foster child in gang-ridden South-Central Los Angeles confessed the book is untrue. Not only did Seltzer lie about her life story but she also fabricated a foundation called International Brother/SisterHood which she listed in the back flap of her book and for which set up the web site, brothersisterhood.com to help promote her book.

The fake International Brother/SisterHood’s mission was “to help reduce gang violence and mentor urban teens.”

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Comedian Dan Nainan tells the NY Times how he stays green while on the road performing comedy. These tips are great for all travelers, no sense of humor required, just a sense of compassion.

When I get to the hotel, the first thing I do is to put the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door. My goal is to keep housekeeping out of my room for my two- or three-day stay. I want my sheets and towels changed before I get to my room, but I don’t need a daily change once I’m there. I don’t wash and then switch linens every day at home, and if you are honest, neither do you. So why do we need to have it done while we are traveling? Imagine the water that could be saved and chemicals that wouldn’t have to be used if all of us road warriors said it was O.K. to sleep on the same sheets for a few nights.

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As if we needed one more reason why war is bad, The New York Times published a piece about murders committed by current war veterans in the US.

Described as a “quiet phenomenon” many of these crimes were said to be in part the result of emotional trauma caused by the veterans’ wartime experiences. The New York Times reported 121 confirmed murders committed by veterans, with the assumption that there were probably more.

The blog Soldier’s Home gives an excellent synopsis of the lengthy, nine-page Times investigation offering the major facts presented by the Times:

-Three quarters of the 121 cases studied by the Times involved the veterans committing murder while still in the military.
-More than half of the killings involved guns.
-About one third of the victims were “spouses, girlfriends, children or other relatives.”
-About one quarter of the victims were fellow service members.
-Murders committed by active-duty military personnel rose 89 percent from the pre-war period to present day (184 cases to 349) - three quarters of these cases involved Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.
-13 of the 121 veterans committed suicide after committing the murders.
-Of the 121 veterans only one was a woman.

The Times explains that clearly, committing homicide is an extreme manifestation of dysfunction for returning veterans, many of whom struggle in quieter ways, with crumbling marriages, mounting debt, deepening alcohol dependence or more-minor tangles with the law. But these killings provide a kind of echo sounding for the profound depths to which some veterans have fallen, whether at the bottom of a downward spiral or in a sudden burst of violence.

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The New York Times reports that federal appeals court on Monday revived a legal challenge to the federal No Child Left Behind education law, saying that school districts have been justified in complaining that the law required them to pay for testing and other programs without providing sufficient federal money.The 2-to-1 ruling from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, gave new life to a 2005 lawsuit and appeared to be a setback to the Bush administration. The ruling came on a day when President Bush marked the law’s sixth anniversary with a visit to an elementary school in Chicago, where he said, “I know No Child Left Behind has worked.” Isn’t it ironic? Don’t ya think?

In today’s New York Times there was a story called “I’ve Been in that Club, Just Not in Real Life” about a bizarre, fascinating, very cool, yet very not cool virtual lower east side life you can live online.The piece reports: Like their flesh-and-blood counterparts, the computer-generated residents of VLES (which opened to the public last week) are free to walk a familiar gritty strip between Houston and Rivington Streets, befriend one another, watch music videos, hang out at rock shows, form their own bands and get into as much after-hours miscreancy as the Web site’s programmers will allow. If that concept isn’t weird enough, the effort to recreate the hip, artistic spirit and distinctive geography of the tiny but creatively fertile neighborhood is the brainchild of MTV, an entertainment brand synonymous with populist fare and mass appeal.So I visited the LES or what my virtual tour guide called “a mecca of all things creative.”

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By Giulia Rozzi

I am typing this with one hand and blowing my non-stop dripping nose with the other. It’s flu season, and all across the country folks are sneezing, weezing, and coughing thier way through the misery.

But why is it that we all get sick inthe winter? After many failed hypotheses, today’s NY Times explains “the answer, they say, has to do with the virus itself. It is more stable and stays in the air longer when air is cold and dry.”

Makes you want to move to Hawaii, huh?

 For more on preventing  the flu this season visit: http://www.preventtheflu.com/